Gay: The Beggar's Opera
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: John Gay
Genre:
Opera
Label: Decca
Magazine Review Date: 5/1991
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 125
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 430 066-2DH2
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (The) Beggar's Opera |
John Gay, Composer
Alfred Marks, Peachum Angela Lansbury, Mrs Peachum Ann Murray, Jenny Diver, Mezzo soprano Anne Wilkens, Dolly Trull, Mezzo soprano Anthony Rolfe Johnson, Filch, Tenor Graham Clark, Matt, Tenor James Morris, Macheath, Baritone Joan Sutherland, Lucy, Soprano John Gay, Composer John Gibbs, Jemmy Twitcher, Baritone Kiri Te Kanawa, Polly, Soprano London Voices Michael Hordern, Player National Philharmonic Orchestra Regina Resnik, Mrs Trapes, Soprano Richard Bonynge, Conductor Stafford Dean, Lockit, Baritone Warren Mitchell, Beggar |
Author: Andrew Lamb
The musical content of John Gay's The Beggar's Opera has always been a movable feast, and in their 1981 version Richard Bonynge and Douglas Gamley moved it as much as their predecessors. The most familiar of the traditional airs that Gay used are all there, but, as Bonynge and Gamley state in their introductory note, ''a number of the original melodies have been rejected... and some new ones incorporated''. The whole has been adapted for singers and full-size symphony orchestra, ''with at least some of the satirical element of the original retained by gentle parodying of a wide-range of eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth-century musical styles''.
Those committed to period-style performance may thus read no further, and yet it would be a pity to miss something that really works remarkably well. The dialogue has been tastefully pruned and modified and, for recording purposes, it was surely sensible to upgrade the singing ability above what might be tolerated in the theatre. At the same time, it is the musical theatre performers and the lighter singers who come off best. The likes of Angela Lansbury and Alfred Marks know how to put the text across in a musical context, and it is around them that the performance really revolves.
Of the more serious singers, James Morris sings superbly as Macheath, but he is less at home with the dialogue, while the two Dames seem to me too heavily operatic for a work that was conceived as an antidote to opera proper. Yet it is difficult to fault numbers such as the Polly/Macheath duet ''Pretty Polly, say''. In supporting roles Anthony Rolfe Johnson makes an excellent Filch, and Regina Resnik a formidable Mrs Trapes. At the end of the day the result is undeniably a successful and highly enjoyable modern realization of Gay's classic work.'
Those committed to period-style performance may thus read no further, and yet it would be a pity to miss something that really works remarkably well. The dialogue has been tastefully pruned and modified and, for recording purposes, it was surely sensible to upgrade the singing ability above what might be tolerated in the theatre. At the same time, it is the musical theatre performers and the lighter singers who come off best. The likes of Angela Lansbury and Alfred Marks know how to put the text across in a musical context, and it is around them that the performance really revolves.
Of the more serious singers, James Morris sings superbly as Macheath, but he is less at home with the dialogue, while the two Dames seem to me too heavily operatic for a work that was conceived as an antidote to opera proper. Yet it is difficult to fault numbers such as the Polly/Macheath duet ''Pretty Polly, say''. In supporting roles Anthony Rolfe Johnson makes an excellent Filch, and Regina Resnik a formidable Mrs Trapes. At the end of the day the result is undeniably a successful and highly enjoyable modern realization of Gay's classic work.'
Gay: The Beggar's Opera
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